


Cousins

by waterbird13



Series: Tumblr Fics [422]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Leverage, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Gen, Long Lost Relatives
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-24
Updated: 2017-05-24
Packaged: 2018-11-04 13:48:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 470
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10992192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/waterbird13/pseuds/waterbird13
Summary: Alec Hardison is James Rhodes' younger long-lost cousin. They reconnect in a weird way.





	Cousins

Rhodey had met Hardison a few times when the kid was small, but the age difference was pretty huge, so he hadn’t had much real connection to his distant cousin. Hasn’t even really thought about the kid in years.

And that’s just the way of things until he’s standing in an active war zone one day, and his cellphone–which is not supposed to be getting texts–buzzes.

“Military intel shit, the base is active. Be prepared.”

Rhodey blinks at his phone, thinks it’s Tony, but Tony signs his messages and probably would have called or shown up himself.

“Who is this?” He demands.

“Your cousin Hardison. Also–ur mom still make that chocolate cake? My girl loves chocolate & I got a guy who could prob cook it almost as good as ur mom.”

Rhodey stares at his phone, but’s it’s pretty damn good confirmation that this person is Hardison, because really, who else knows he has a cousin called Hardison and that his Mom makes killer chocolate cake?

“How do you know about the base?”

“Was pokin round 4 sumthin else. Ask Stark if u don’t believe me.”

Rhodey does, makes a phone call from a secured location where he’s not even supposed to have a phone, but then again, he’s an Avenger, they really should expect it by now.

“Tony wants to know if you want a job.”

“No thx, got my own gig. 9-5 would kill me.”

Rhodey doesn’t exactly think Tony’s computer nerds work 9-5, but, hey, as long as the kid has a job.

He pries the chocolate cake recipe out of his mother and sends it along as a thank you for saving his and his team’s ass. He doesn’t hear back for four days, when he gets a bunch of texts at close to midnight.

“The cake tastes like childhood but also got me laid. Conflicted.”

Rhodey snorts and shakes his head.

“Also Eliot makes it as good as ur mom but dont tell her that tell her hers is always better.”

“Mom wants you to come to dinner.”

“Ur parents still in Philly?”

For more than fifty years now. “Where’re you?”

“Portland, but flying np. When?”

The when is a bit of a mess, because he’ll need leave and his Mom will insist on the whole family–siblings, meaning his sisters and their spouses and kids and Tony, the adopted brother no one asked for–being present, so it’ll take some sorting out. But then again, she is good at sorting things and people out.

“Let you know. Bring your people.” The girl, the guy who cooks, whoever they are.

Hardison dropped of the family’s radar a long time ago, unfortunate but true. But it sounds like he has people, people he cares about. And Rhodey’s kind of dying to meet them.


End file.
